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Cleve Backster, who instituted the Central Intelligence Agency's polygraph program in 1948, also has some curious ideas about plants (in particular, that they can perceive human thoughts and intentions), as the following article on Skepdic.com explains:

Backster seems to believe that there is a conspiracy in the scientific community to discredit his revolutionary discovery that plants can read human thought. But scientists have been unable to reproduce his results under controlled conditions.

The News for the Soul radio program, which currently offers for sale via its website a "Spoonbending Kit," also makes available at no cost some interviews with Cleve Backster, the father of the CIA polygraph program, which Agency he only mentions in passing, preferring to speak instead on the mind-reading abilities of plants and other organisms. The following streaming broadcasts are in RealPlayer format:

The ouijha board is supposed to tell the truth from your subconscious mind - also the penfulum - but is it possible to quiz one's own subconscious USING A LIE DETECTOR??? Surely you would get the truth????? Hope you don't consider this a silly question. YOURS FAITHFULLY, DES, DUBLIN, SUN.SEPT.25, 2011.EMAIL: des48fitz@gmail.com***************************************

While some had difficulty replicating Backster's experiments, it's probably for the wrong reasons. I have been able to replicate them, finding plants respond to human emotion, as part of an honors thesis I did at UC Berkeley. The investigators that are cited on skepdic actually didn't follow Backster's protocols, and thus introduced other confounds that they didn't consider. So their bad science makes it look like Backster's findings were invalid.

I've had to take a bit of a hiatus on this line of research while working on my PhD, but I'm planning to collect more data in order to publish.

Not that it influences the truth of anything, but Backster is a kind, well-meaning fellow. Obviously here you're invested in disproving the validity of polygraph use, which I don't have enough background in to dispute. I also believe one reason why he doesn't talk about his work with the CIA is he's not supposed to.

That notwithstanding, the plant research is indeed valid, and hopefully there will be some more data coming out in the next year or two.